This week and last I’ve been following Humans of New York on Instagram as they highlight the
Special Olympic World Games going on in Dubai. Oh My Gosh! Go get your phones right now
and follow along too! It is the best! You will not be sorry. You will be delighted and encouraged
and reminded just how easy it is to find joy, and how uncomplicated and beautiful it is to be real.
The posts so far have not highlighted the “elite” athletes or their families who are incredible and
are certainly people to be admired. The posts instead have focused on the more “regular”
people participating and attending the games. People more like me. People more like my
daughter. People I relate to.
The first post I saw was about a young man from Costa Rica who is attending the games as a
journalist. The photo in the post shows him standing (all credentialed up) between his mother
and grandmother, wearing an appropriate journalist’s khaki vest, and a lanyard around his neck.
He says he came to interview coaches and athletes. He says his mother’s job on the trip is to
help him think of good questions to ask, and says his grandmother’s job is to have fun even
though it hurts her to walk. He says he couldn’t imagine doing this without them. He talks about
his job with a big company and about how happy he is to have it. He is real and beautiful and
full of joy. (In the photo, his mom and grandmother are beaming!)
Next I read about a woman with intellectual disabilities who had suffered the loss of her father,
whom she called her greatest champion. She talks of how difficult it was for her to cope. She
describes love and encouragement she received from her sister, and eventually her community.
She speaks of healing. She shared a poem. She is real and beautiful and able again to find
much joy.
There is a post of two women, the first female athletes from Saudi Arabia. The post talks about
how excited they are to be at the games. One of the women describes the way she feels as just
“wow”. She speaks of the responsibility she feels, as captain of the basketball team, to be happy
and positive. She says that she claps when her team makes a shot and she claps also when
they miss. She talks about encouraging her teammates with words and then rubbing their
shoulders. She talks of blowing kisses to her friend on the team as they play. She is real. She is
kind. She is love.
There is a post about two brothers. The younger describes the older as having special needs,
and describes how in an upside-down way he has always been his older brother’s role model.
The older wants to be like the younger. He’d love nothing more than to have a wife, and a car
and a house and eventually a family. The younger brother wants that for the older too, but
speaks of the very real possibility that he will be caring for his older brother for the rest of his
life; and how he’s okay with that. The brothers are real, their love for each other so strong and
so tender.
There are posts of coaches with big hearts and moms whose hearts are wrung out daily with
emotion. The coaches and the moms, they are vulnerable, they are real.
The world is complicated, I get caught up in it, and I waste time and energy on the unimportant.
This series grabbed hold of me. It’s grounding. It’s perspective putting. I know that life is
complicated, and I know that we don’t have to be. I know that we can be real. Real is beautiful.
Now, go on take a look! You’ll be glad you did.
